It’s Sunday night.
My puffy eyes pair with rosy cheeks to frame a face of despair.
I am so well versed on how to speak to emergency services it’s ludicrous.
“Oh she’s just through the back, banging her head on the floor, she’s bleeding.
“Actually not too bad tonight in the scheme of things,” I tell the paramedic.
The person I am directing them to is my seventeen-year-old sister. She has a diagnosis of borderline personality disorder, anxiety and depression.
Tonight is just another routine visit from the police and ambulance. I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve seen her in handcuffs, purely from being a danger to no one but herself.
I’ve grown numb to the trauma of her outbursts. Nothing really shocks me anymore. My family and I have talked her off the ledge more times we can count.
When you love someone like I love my sister, your animal tendencies take over. I truly believe I have a maternal instinct that ignites when she is in trouble.
Tonight I could see that her pain wasn’t going to wear away with fatigue like it sometimes does. She needed professionals that were going to force her to stop.
All I want is to stop her pain. To stop her hurting. But I’m realising more and more that my family and I aren’t equipped to deal with her in the state she reaches.
We call these events “episodes”, as if they are instalments of a television series we didn’t subscribe to.
Just like with your favourite sitcom, every episode you watch helps you understand the format of what’s to come.
We know the script like the back of our hand. But we are trying so desperately to break this cycle.
I feel at the moment that my sister’s well-being and my family’s well-being can’t be simultaneous. It feels like the resources aren’t there to serve us all at the same time.
I want to be selfish and ask for it all at once. We all deserve to be well. It isn’t fair that one only happens at the sacrifice of another.
Mental illness is so silent and invisible that it is impossible to understand unless you are unfortunate enough to experience it.
No one deserves to see their loved one tortured from the inside out.
My family doesn’t deserve to keep seeing someone they love tortured by their own mind.
I truly believe there is light at the end of this long and dark tunnel.
But if there was an express service to get us to the other side, I would buy a ticket in a heartbeat.
Afterword:
This picture was taken a few hours before tonight's episode. Our smiles are 100% real- that's how quickly things can change.
People can be high functioning and suffer from severe mental illnesses.
Remember this next time you're quick to judge another person because they seem "fine" on the outside.
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